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I had to pull a big, dead doe out of my pond at my old place. It was disgusting. We pulled it over to the fence line and it was GONE within a week. No sign of it left at all. Thank god, because at the time I didn't have a tractor/atv/mule or anything else to deal with it. I knew my gelding wouldn't get anywhere near it. He HATES the smell of dead stuff - and if he wouldn't go over there, the other two would stay away, too.

I've usually got 1 or 2 rotting deer on my place at any given moment. Because I am not of sturdy pioneer stock, and therefore prefer to maintain a seemly distance between myself and such putrefying corpses as are endemic to the country life, it is my policy to leave'em be and let nature take its course. Generally, within a week the buzzards and furry woodland creatures have conveniently dispensed with the main stinkage. The dogs, though. Whoa. I've got a yella lab from whose throat I must often extract lengths of deer hide as long as my arm. I avert my eyes and scream like a Justin Bieber groupie during this process. Then I fling the hide into the nearest cactus, with the result that the farm is gradually beginning to resemble a sort of stone age tannery.

Just have to share - last fall my husband was sitting on our front porch around 9:30 when he saw a big buck get hit by a pickup truck right in front of our house. Buck killed, pickup probably totalled. When the cop got there hubby asked what he was going to do with the buck - cop said he usually would call DPW and they'd send a truck out to get it in the morning. BUT if the buck was gone by then, that would be fine, too. Hubby comes upstairs all excited to tell me about this wonderful development!

Then he dragged the buck out back with our lawn tractor and butchered it in the woods by flashlight. We had lots of yummy venison all winter and I now call our house the Roadkill Cafe.

One of our illustrious neighbors poached a deer in our neighborhood-it died next to our pasture and F&G said whoever wanted to take the meat could take it. We grabbed it-it was a clean shot with a broadhead and the deer was just dead when we got to it-nice little jumpstart on hunting season.

Thoroughly traumatized the vegan neighbor that had been feeding the young buck in her yard all summer.

I'm assuming the deer is gone or just about by now?
A normal, healthy ecosystem should eliminate a deer in 48-72 hours at the most. I drag them into an open, visible area and then just watch. I may have a skull left ater 48 hours...that doesn't have as much "chewy" as the clean up crews seem to prefer. Everything else is gone.

You jump in the saddle,
Hold onto the bridle!
Jump in the line!
...Belefonte

I'm going to take a walk over tomorrow and see what the situation is so that I can report back. If it's not well on it's way then I might go down the covering-it-with-manure route to see if that helps the process along.

You folks seem to be missing the point that that's 200+ pounds of perfectly good fertilizer! Dig a hole, dump the deer in, add a touch of lime, and plant a tree on top! Bonus points if it's a tree that produces fruit or nuts!

You folks seem to be missing the point that that's 200+ pounds of perfectly good fertilizer! Dig a hole, dump the deer in, add a touch of lime, and plant a tree on top! Bonus points if it's a tree that produces fruit or nuts!

So would it produce deer nuts?

The inherent vice of Capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings. The inherent virtue of Socialism is the equal sharing of miseries.Winston Churchill

I had a dead dear in my back yard once, that I totally didn't notice and neither did the dogs. My dad stopped over one morning on his way out and was standing in the living room looking out my back windows with his cup of coffee and said "Kate - Why is there a dead dear in your yard?"

Me: "No there isn't!?"

Him: "Yep, there is. Right there by the tree."

So, we both get our coats and boots on and trudge out there to take a look and it had clearly been hit by a car. It had a compound fracture of the leg. So my dad's poking at it and says "This things been dead for a while. It's got riggle tortoise."

Me: "Riggle tortoise Dad? Really? Where'd you learn that?"

Him: "I watch those CSI shows."

Gotta love him really. He strung a rope on it and dragged it to the swampy area next to the corn field. The coyotes and fox cleaned it up over the next couple of weeks.

So, I wandered over yesterday to check on the carcass status. To begin with I couldn't even FIND the deer - then, way out in the pasture I saw a rib cage, then in the opposite direction a skull, another way a hip bone etc. Basically there are totally picked clean bones all over the pasture but not a single piece of flesh anywhere. Absolutely amazing!!!

Very efficient. Even more so in warm seasons with the additional help from the bugs. Middle of a cold winter might take a little longer due to lack of some birds and bugs. But it's often found faster due to hunger.

You jump in the saddle,
Hold onto the bridle!
Jump in the line!
...Belefonte